Stella Forner will never forget her first wedding anniversary. It was March of 1976 and she spent the day at the Mexican consulate in Montevideo, Uruguay, which was in the midst of a military dictatorship. She, her husband and their baby weren’t there for a romantic celebration but to ask for political asylum. They had no idea how long it would be until they again felt at home in their own country.

Martina: Welcome to the Duolingo Spanish Podcast — I’m your host, Martina Castro, and each episode we bring you fascinating first-person stories from Spanish speakers across the world. The storytellers will be using intermediate Spanish and I will be chiming in for context, in English. But these are not language lessons, they're real life lessons through language.

Martina: Stella Forner was born in Montevideo, Uruguay, in 1954. She grew up in a leftist household, where it was common to talk about politics, the Russian revolution and the plight of the working class.

Martina: This changed the stakes for Stella… Prison and death: they were just around the corner, if she wasn’t careful. On June 27, 1973, the Uruguayan military dissolved the parliament and officially took hold of leadership in Uruguay. They immediately took measures to suppress political parties and activities, especially those from the left. The unions reacted by calling for a general strike and the occupation of factories and universities.

Martina: About a month after her son’s birth, Stella heard some disturbing news.

Stella: Alguien nos cantó y tuvimos que escapar.

Martina: Cantar -- the word literally means “to sing,” but at this time in Uruguay, to say that someone “te cantó” meant that they had snitched on you. It was a term commonly used to describe when political prisoners gave up the names of their colleagues, often after being tortured. That’s when Stella knew she had to leave her house and go into hiding. They became political refugees, or refugiados.

Martina: They didn’t think the dictatorship would last that long, maybe a few months tops. So they continued hiding, changing homes every few days to make sure the military never caught up with them. Until one day, Stella turned on the TV and saw her husband’s face.

Martina: He was listed among the fugitives the military was hunting down. It was too risky to continue living in hiding. They needed asylum. Stella had heard the Mexican ambassador was willing to take in political prisoners. So on March 19, 1976, on her first wedding anniversary, Stella and her family went to the Mexican consulate.

Martina: During that time, the embajador, or ambassador, and the consulate of Mexico gave refuge to hundreds of Uruguayan political activists. The Mexican president had opened up its embassies in Argentina and Chile as well.

Martina: At first, there was a steady flow of airplanes out of Uruguay carrying the exiles who had managed to secure special visas to get asylum in Mexico. But then the Uruguayan government decided to stop issuing the visas.

Martina: The Mexican ambassador, Vicente Muñiz Arroyo, played a key role here because he refused to kick the exiles out of the embassy. This began a waiting game for the exiles, one that was made more difficult given the disparity in their situations.

Martina: “Desaparecidos” were people who had disappeared or gone missing. Nobody knew if they were alive or dead, but people believed they had been killed by the military. There are still close to 200 “desaparecidos” in Uruguay from that time.

Martina: At that moment the exiles started organizing committees, which they called “comisiones”. Each committee had a specific task, like cleaning the house, taking care of the small children, or resolving conflicts that came up in daily life.

Martina: Stella remembers one of the doctor’s sons being rather jealous of Guillermo, her son, because he had both of his parents with him in the embassy. When Guillermo would sleep, the kid would wake him up by hitting him with a pillow.

Martina: Stella held onto the hope that the dictatorship would dissolve soon and everyone could go back home. But on June 28, 1976, the situation for the exiles in the Mexican embassy took a turn for the worse.

Martina: On that day, Elena Quinteros, a local teacher, jumped over the wall of the embassy of Venezuela.

Martina: Through the whole process, Ambassador Vicente Muñiz Arroyo was very supportive of the refugees. Some days, he even gave up his own bed so it was available for those who didn’t have anywhere else to sleep.

Martina: In July of 1976, it had been four months since Stella and her family entered the Mexican ambassador’s home, when suddenly they got word that the Ambassador’s diplomatic work to secure their visas had been successful. Something Stella had never considered likely was happening -- they were leaving Uruguay.

Martina: They cautiously got into a car, which was surrounded by the Uruguayan military. They were escorted to the airport by a motorcade of military vehicles, international human rights organizations, and members of the Mexican embassy.

Martina: Stella made it onto the plane with her family. The Mexican ambassador and his staff were close behind them. They didn’t leave Stella’s side until right before the door of the plane closed behind them. As the plane took off, Stella waved to her father who had accompanied them to the airport. She wondered to herself...

Martina: Stella remembers being struck by the crowds of people at the airport waving Uruguayan flags. She remembers thinking, “Someone important must be coming today because look at all these people!” But they were there for her and for the hundreds of exiles returning to Uruguay since democracy had been restored. It was a historic event.

Martina: Stella Forner now lives in Uruguay and works as a copy editor at city hall in Montevideo. This story was produced by Florencia Flores Iborra, a Uruguayan podcast producer based in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

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